The Worst Day Since Yesterday
by Emeline Pigott
Summary: Is it really ever okay to sacrifice the many for the one? Sam has to make a choice.


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The Worst Day Since Yesterday

Summary: Is it really ever okay to sacrifice the one for the many? Sam has to make a choice.

**I don't even know why I started this 'cause I'm up to my ears in fics but the idea is stalking me…so here it is. And right…me? Owns nothing. and yes, I am aware that sam doesn't have visions any more but consider them a gift for a friend of mine who quite misses sammy with visions.**

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"Oh, but you're so silly Dean." Lilith giggled, "You know you Winchesters are my favorite. You're _so_ funny. Get out of hell?" She smiled primly.

"I'm gonna destroy you, you bitch." He managed, struggling against the restraints, which held him down. Really, they were actually worse than restraints. They looked like chicken wire twisted together into a thick black rope but they weren't. they were like what made up the stems of roses but worse. It didn't matter what you did, it crawled up and under your skin and tore at everything—and nothing ever went numb.

If he ever got out of here he was never buying anyone roses again.

"Dean," She said this in the way a parent trying to be patient with an impetuous child would. "You can't ever get out of here." She glanced down at her wrist, as if checking the watch she didn't wear. "I on the other hand, have an appointment with a little girl just _dying _to make a little deal with me.

"Bitch." He spat at her.

Lilith frowned. "_Don't_ say that Dean, I don't _like_ bad words." She turned away from him, and then as an after thought, turned back to look at him with the almost ever present perfect, pearly smile.

_Fucking bitch thinks she's the Cheshire cat._

He knew she heard every thought. She always heard every thought. It was like making his hell the worst had become her secondary mission to taking over the world.

"Oh, never secondary Dean." She stopped and then remedied her words. "Except—maybe to Sam, but that's nothing new to you. Haven't you always been second to him? He's so much more interesting to you. After all, even you know…he's the only one who knows how to kill me."

Dean was silent, biting down on his tongue so he wouldn't say anything; refusing to let her win at this. Just because he was in hell didn't mean he had to let Lilith win.

00000

_Dean!_

Sam woke in a cold sweat, shooting straight up in bed. Dean. And Bobby was wrong it wasn't just some nightmare, it was a vision. He knew what the fuck the difference was between his visions and a damn nightmare, he was the one having them for christ's sake. And you don't feel it in nightmares. In a nightmare he wouldn't sense the fear chilling the blood in his body until it stopped cold, he wouldn't feel-feel—god! He didn't know what, digging into Dean's skin, into his skin, his body, feeling like it was filleting the flesh from his bones. In a dream he would be able to feel Dean being that scared, hearing his heart race…he couldn't.

He _told_ Bobby sleeping wasn't an option.

00000

Dean had been in hell for four months. Four months. It was an eternity. All Sam could think during those four months was how was he going to dig his brother out of hell? How could he have gone off to school, and left his family the way he had? How could he do this? Dean had sacrificed everything to keep him alive…and he couldn't even get him out of hell.

How could he abandon Dean _again_?

All he had was his guilt, and visions, and a promise and he'd die before he broke it.

He didn't care what it took; he was going to break that deal though. He promised Dean that he'd break the deal, and he would. He just didn't know how, yet.

But Ruby would, and she was going to help him. Because she climbed out of hell more than a few times and he knew she knew. She fucking _knew_.

00000

"Sam! You _can't_ save your brother anymore." Ruby didn't know what she needed to do to get this through her head. She had never, in her entire life—human and demonic—known any two men who were as difficult and thick headed as the Winchesters.

Forget that...they were morons. Fucking morons. Worse than that even, they were idiots with a death wish.

"I have to."

"Are you completely mentally challenged?" Ruby questioned him, "Huh? I mean, what in the hell was the point in summoning me—which on another note, I don't like for my presence to be demanded. Maybe you missed the memo, but I'm _not_ your lap dog. Next time _call_…and say _please_."

"I need your help."

"No, we are so past my helping you...especially when all you have is a death wish. All I'm here for is to watch the show. Maybe you're not familiar with this, but hell is a place I don't ever intend to go back to, no one _wants_ to be in hell." She thought about that and shrugged, appending her previous statement, "Except the Winchesters, of course."

"You said you'd help me."

"Help you kill Lilith, yes. I want that bitch dead more than you could _ever_ know. Help you to get not just yourself, but I too, killed. Hell, no."

"Ruby, you climbed out of hell. I need you to tell me how you did it."

"Okay, lets pretend for one moment that I've lost my mind and decided to help you orchestrate the great escape…how do you even plan on doing this? Its not like you can Fed Ex the escape route to hell."

"Demons can go anywhere they want at any time, right?"

"No." Ruby shook her head. "Whatever in the hell it is you think you're doing…don't you dare. And I never signed on to help you off yourself. So if that's what you got yourself set on…go for it, I don't want a damn thing to do with it."

"You don't have to do anything. All I need is a little help. All I need from you is to show me..." Sam's voice trialed off as the full realization of what he was asking her to do hit him. He was asking Ruby to show him how to...

Ruby's lips turned into a big pink 'o' and then it was like she changed.

"Well, how about that," She just about drawled, "Sam Winchester, the golden boy, is ready to see the truth?"

She knew damn well what he was asking her. To teach him how to use his demonic powers.

Given, these weren't the circumstances she had been shooting for but...she'd learned awhile back that where the Winchester's were concerned, flexibility was a must.

"I don't care. I'm doing it to save Dean...I'm not going to let him rot in hell."

"Well, thats just great. so you're going to get both of yourselves offed." Ruby shook her head, she swore, working with anything else would have been easier. It had to be the fucking Winchesters. "For once in your life, Sam, please, don't do the god damn stupid thing. You can't save your brother, okay? You _can't_."

"I can do anything I want to do." Sam replied, after all if he couldn't...why was Lilith so scared of him. If he had that bitch freaked by him, he knew he at least had to be powerful enough to pull Dean out of hell. And if he didn't so be it...he'd die trying.

"That's my point. You can try to save your brother and _get yourself killed_ in the process. Or you can save the billons of people that without you, Lilith will destroy. Its up to you."

"I can do both." Sam said, "I can save Dean and then we'll take care of Lilith."

Ruby shook her head, "Don't you get it? You can't. The truth is this: Okay, just maybe, you do this and there is the slimist of chances that you might be able to save Dean...or you can save the world. You can't have both. Even you aren't that powerful, Sam."


End file.
